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It was another long day. A long day of making my best effort to burn the Wood back to its original borders. In the short time I was gone, to help Marek free the Queen from the heart-tree, the Wood had gained almost a mile at the Zatochek boarder. And with Agnieszka’s reckless use of the fire-heart on her village’s corrupted cows, I had to use my magic to do most of the burning, which left me completely drained. So drained that when I transported myself back to the Tower I tripped and nearly fell face first at the front door. “Damn that impossible girl,” I said out loud, brushing myself off. She will be the death of me one way or another.
As I closed the Tower doors I could see the sun nearly finished setting over the valley, smoke rising in the east, staining an otherwise cloudless sky. I looked down at my clothes and hands, full of ash, stinking of smoke and perspiration. I could feel the dirt and ash clinging to my skin, tasting it in my mouth. I didn’t like it.
With a groan, I went upstairs fully intending to go to my rooms and clean myself up but for some reason I found myself lingering in the library’s entry. Every book was in its proper place, not a speck of dirt anywhere, no (it would be a kindness to even call it food) but, no food waiting for me, turning ice cold on the tray because somebody couldn’t be bothered to learn even a simple warming cantrip! And why should she bother when she can easily cure corruption, pull girls out of heart-trees, and steal my magic to make pretty flowers.
I let out a frustrated sigh and shrugged out of my singed cloak, the room suddenly feeling oppressively empty. I perched myself on the chair beside the table. Who was I kidding, the whole Tower felt like an empty, lifeless, hole ever since Agnieszka left for the capital to become a confirmed witch.
Maybe some small part of me missed her mess, missed the nonsense way she would try to explain her impossible magic, missed her sitting in the library reading that nonsense Jaga spell book, thinking it perfectly sensible.
No matter how much I fought it, I couldn’t help smiling, picturing her stomping about the library with her dirty bare feet, stained homespun dress and that messy loose knot of hair on top of her head that would fall out all over the place, biting her lip when I would try to teach her the proper way to do magic.
It was a funny thing; her magic. It had no structure, no order, no way of quantifying it. It was raw power and pure chaos, much like life itself. I really hadn’t thought Agnieszka had had much talent at all, accept for destruction, until she was able to cleanse me of corruption from the wolf attack.
How she had done it shouldn’t have worked. It was impossible. And something that can’t be explained simply frustrates me to no end. Then, my interest in her was purely intellectual of course. She was just this curious mystery to be solved, data to be quantified, nothing more. Although, during those days, I found my eyes wandering a bit too much on her messy hair. I really couldn’t discern if it pleased me or if it was just part of my own compulsive nature to want to fix it, I tend to think the later.
Not until she had merged her magic with mine during our first illusion spell did I feel her, pull. The first time I felt it, it literally took my breath away. The feeling of soothing cool water on a hot day, of life and nature and growth, but most of all, of home. Her magic, it grew and crept beneath all my defenses and before the illusion was even over I knew that she had stirred feelings in me that I had long ago stopped believing in, feelings I never truly felt before. It wasn’t only her magic that pulled me, but it was like her magic allowed me to see her, brave and caring and loyal.
Afterward, I had almost convinced myself that she could have accidently put some sort of binding spell on me. I had hopes that maybe there was some way to reverse it. After some intensive research and a few days doing my best to avoid her, I found that no such spell would be possible on a human soul. I knew it was a longshot anyway, I am an experienced wizard and I know the difference between the pull of a spell and that of an emotion and unfortunately this was no spell.
After I privately built up a bit more resolve, I continued giving her lessons. No matter how distracted I was, I shoved the feeling down as best I could. After all, a witch that powerful deserved all the knowledge I could give her. Teaching her would be my only purpose.
I could have went on that way too, strictly as her teacher. Perhaps, over time, the feelings would diminish. Then I had to go and damn myself to hell with that kiss. That silly, sloppy, amazing kiss. I had only myself to blame for that, I had sealed my doom and would be forever weak for her.
I caught myself staring at the corner of the room where it happened, felt the ghost of her mouth on mine, magic and bodies tangled up together, her cool hand on my bare chest, my hand – Ugh. That shameful longing was creeping in again. Pathetic.
“Pathetic!” I shouted aloud, rising from my chair, flames from the library heath nearly leaping out, my hands balled into fists, shadows darkening the room. “I am the foremost wizard of Polnya, reduced to a love sick, google eyed, soft, puppy love, school boy!” I kicked the chair for good measure. “Curse the day I ever laid an eye on that backwater, nonsense, village girl!” I stormed out of the library with a flurry of curses, just like I had done for about the tenth time that week, mistakenly thinking I had won back some of my resolve. I swear she torments me more with her absence than she does with her presents.
Just as I made it to the landing of my rooms, I felt it. Her pull. Her magic, soothing and cool. It was just a little tug at first, like she was playfully poking me with her finger. I turned on my heel, fully expecting her to be right behind me.
Of course, she wasn’t, I knew for a fact she was still in the capital. How could I have possibly imagined something so real? I guess I really was becoming a crazy old fool.
I made my way to the wash basin in my bedroom, tearing off my dirty shirt, intending to douse myself in some cool water, (Lord knows, I needed it). But before I could get there, I felt it again. It was much stronger this time, almost desperate. Her magic nearly bringing me to my knees. Something was wrong. This was not my imagination. Agnieszka need me.
I felt panic rise within me. Losing all sense of reason, my mind went to a dozen different dark places in a matter of seconds, picturing her in trouble or hurt or worse! If any one of those morons in the capital hurt her I would burn them to ash!
I wasn’t sure what to do or how to help, I was pacing circles around my room like an idiot, but then the hold of her magic on me loosened a bit and in her odd Agnieszka way, her magic told me what to do. It tugged me along, wanted me to follow it, almost like an echo of her hand beckoning me.
Before I knew it I was back in the library. “Why on earth do you want me here?” I said to the air. I glanced around the room and saw nothing, so I went in a little further waiting for her magic to give me another hint.
When none came I was starting to get worried again, so I did the only thing I could, I reached back with my own magic like we did for the illusion spell.
Suddenly, her face came into view right in front of mine. The illusion was faded and transparent but it was defiantly her. Carefully, I feed more of my magic into it to give it some structure. There she was, the perfect illusion form of Agnieszka standing right in front me, messy hair and all. I could vaguely make out the background behind her, it looked like she was in a small bedroom perhaps.
The illusion version of Agnieszka closed her eyes and leaned into my face. For a second I almost thought she was going to kiss me, but when she was inches from me, she opened her eyes, a furious look on her face, grabbed me by the shoulders and started shaking me. What the hell is happening, an illusion shouldn’t be able to do this! “Let go of me you lunatic!” I shouted.
“Sarkan? You’re real,” she looked me up and down. “What, what happened to you?” seeing me shirtless and covered in ash.
“You, happened to me,” I bit out.
“What?”
“All that fire-heart you used, now the Wood is trying to take Zatochek and I have only my magic to stop it!”
“Sorry. At least it gets you out of the Tower a bit. The sun looks good on you,” she smiled. Impossible girl! Talking of the sun of all things!
“How is this even possible?” I said, trying to give her my best scowl.
“I’m not sure. I was just doing a normal illusion spell but at the same time I really wanted to talk to you. So, when I got angry, because I couldn’t talk to you, I shook you and the illusion you changed into the real you. And by the way, my illusion version of you was wearing a shirt, and was much cleaner.”
“And your illusion version of me was in the library?” she nodded her head in response.
Just then a door behind Agnieszka opened and Kasia came into the room. A saw Agnieszka almost lose focus of the spell so I instinctively feed more of my magic into it. Luckily, she regained her focus on me and the illusion held or should I say, non-illusion. I could see Kasia staring at me wide eyed right behind Agnieszka.
“Nieszka, don’t you think that’s just a little bit inappropriate? At least last time you illusioned him in here he had more clothes on.” I saw the color rising in Agnieszka’s face.
“Kasia, stop,” she pleaded, still keeping her eyes fixed on me, trying to keep the spell going.
“Looks like you enhanced him too, I doubt he’s even that muscular under all those fancy clothes.” She teasingly jabbed Agnieszka with her elbow and giggled.
“Kasia, he’s real,” Agnieszka said, just above a whisper, as if I couldn’t hear them.
“Hello Kasia,” I said with a sheepish wave. “Trust me when I say, Agnieszka needn’t not enhance any part of me.” I was honestly trying to loosen the tension, put the girl at ease, but her mouth hung open and her eyes went wide. “I’m so sorry, Drago-, My Lord.” Before I could comfort her, she bowed herself out of the room. “I’ll leave you two to your privacy,” she added as she closed the door.
Normally, I would have been angry at such a comment, but when I heard Kasia had been terrified of me for so many years, I’d wish she said worse.
“So, you have made illusions of me before?” Some dark, twisted corner of my heart leapt at the idea of Agnieszka making illusion versions of me in her bedroom.
“Wipe that smirk off your face,” she said. “It was just to think. I do my best thinking when you’re in the room.”
“You know, this really is quite amazing. A working like this is unheard of, as far as I know. It’s revolutionary in fact. You should be proud. ”
“Well, thank you Sarkan.” We fell into silence for a moment. We both took each other in. Her face was still dangerously close to mine. Unexpectedly, she took my hands.
“Strange,” she said, holding one up, “it feels so real.” She held on a few extra moments, her thumbs subtly stroking the inside of my wrists. I was glad when she finally let my hands drop because I was feeling my face begin to flush, but at the same time I wanted more. She stared up at me thoughtfully, biting her lip. My eyes stayed on her lips a bit too long. Ugh- why do I keep looking at her, she’s not even beautiful!
“Maybe we could pass things through,” she suggested, taking up I tin cup from a nearby table on her end. She tried handing me the cup but it went through my hand, clanging to the floor. We did this a few times with the same result. We also tried passing ourselves through but we only succeed in going through one another. She even tried giving me a kind of awkward loose hug, which worked at first, but when she pulled me in to the point where our bodies should have been pressed tightly, we began going through each other again.
“I wonder why I could touch your hand, shake you even?”
I suggested that it was purely our magic touching not our actual bodies, because we knew each other and each other’s magic so well, it only felt real. The only thing carrying through the spell was our voices and magic. Perhaps we needed to be in closer proximity to pass things through.
“So, what is it you needed to say,” I said softly. I felt my face growing warm with anticipation. She leaned in, ever so slightly, just enough for me to feel the air around me humming with her magic. She was looking deeply into my eyes for what seemed like a long time. Unwillingly, my hand drifted up on its own accord and touched a loose strand of hair that had fallen out of the knot, but when I looked back at her she was staring blankly at the spot above my head. Whatever trance we had been in, broken.
“Oh right, the first thing I wanted to say is,” she took a step back and was counting on her fingers like a child, “why didn’t you tell me that it usually takes seven years of training to be a witch? They were asking questions that I had no clue how to answer. At least you could have given me notes or something before I left! If I didn’t do fulmia I would have never gotten on the list.”
“You did fulmia inside the castle! The whole place could have caved in, you idiot!”
“Well it got me on the list, no thanks to you! And second, how come you never mentioned that you take girls from the valley to cut off the Woods power. Alosha said, the people from the valley are like the Woods channel and that’s why we feel bound to the valley. Do you even think of me at all, that I might need to know some things before I mingle with all these capital people?”
I sorted at this comment, because all I did was think of her. Of course she just took it as me being an ass and scowled at me.
“So, you perform groundbreaking, probably hasn’t been done in centuries or ever, spell work and its whole purpose was to make complaints to me!” I took a quill and some parchment out from my desk, muttering curses under my breath. Agnieszka was still staring at me angrily with her arms crossed in front of her chest, waiting for some sort or apology or explanation from me.
“Fine, I’m sorry. I should have given you more detailed information, but you distract me to no end you silly girl!” What I had meant to say was annoy me, but I could see that she took the word distract as almost a compliment, like she had won a prize.
“So, I’m assuming the trial went well, seeing Kasia,” I said, as I sat down at the table testing the quill.
She didn’t answer me. I looked up, she nodded her head and answered, “Both Kasia and the Queen were cleared of corruption.” She wouldn’t look me in the eye. I could tell she was holding something back, which I was going to have to pry out of her.
“And what of the soldiers we need to fight the Wood?” I asked.
“That’s where there’s a slight problem.”
“How slight?” Narrowing my eyes at her.
“I think Marek wants to start a war with Rosya,” she said so quickly I could hardly understand her.
“What! This has your chaos written all over it!”
“No, it was the Queen. She claims that the Rosyan prince took her unwillingly and now Marek wants to start a war.”
“Damn it! Marek’s a fool,” I let out an exacerbated breath. “Before we muddle our heads with politics, can we just write down some notes on how this spell was performed? And can you also mention to Father Ballo that I’m in need of a particular book call –,” I saw her visibly cringe at the man’s name.
“What have you done now?” I shouted.
“About Father Ballo, I'm sorry to have to say it, but he is dead.”
“Dead! How?”
“It’s sort of a long story, but it started when I was looking for a book in the library.”
“So a man’s death starts with you looking for a library book! Only you Agnieszka.” I felt the anger rising in my voice.
“I was looking for a spell book, one that had a spell I could use to talk to you. When I was looking, another book called to me. I touched it and right away I knew it was corrupted. Alosha and I wanted to burn it right there but Father Ballo said, he would take care of it, he must have read it or held it too long because it turned him into a monster. He was attacking everyone in the castle so I shot him with lightning and he . . . died.”
“What tragic irony, a man of the cloth being struck down by lightning. Do you know no decency?” She looked visibly upset, so I did my best to control my temper. “Well, at least you were able stop him. If you hadn’t, I’m sure many more lives would have been lost. How did a book like that even get into the castle?”
“We found it was a gift from the Rosyan prince.”
“So you basically gave Marek even more reason to attack Rosya! I swear Agnieszka, your greatest talent is creating disaster! Aside from Kasia being cleared, things couldn’t be much worse. I’m just sorry I unleashed you on all those capital morons, I knew they wouldn’t know how to handle you.” She was looming over my chair, glaring at me.
“You’re blaming me! You’ve been no help at all! How was I supposed to know the book was from Rosya?” waving her hands wildly.
“First of all, you’re going to have to help me finish the notes, because I don’t have the strength to keep this spell going, then I’ll try to figure out how to clean up your mess later.”
“MY MESS! The hell with your notes, Dragon!” she said in a huff, and with that the spell abruptly collapsed. She let go so forcefully, I nearly fell out of my chair.
It was late into the evening when I finally did finish my notes, leaving space for her to write down what she had done later. I sat in the empty library pondering to myself a moment before going back up to my rooms and thought, how could me of all people, long for such an insane nut job?
The Next Evening
(Agnieszka)
Things at the capital had went from bad too worst and I was in my room making sure I had a bag packed in case I had to leave in a hurry with Kasia.
Just before I was about to get some sleep, I felt the familiar warmth of Sarkans’ magic. But it wasn’t just around me, it was all over me. That warm comfort, in my hair, on my arms, down my legs, up my back, just everywhere. I thought for a moment, maybe he was trying to contact me the way I contacted him last night. Maybe he had something urgent to tell me.
The spell starts as an illusion so all I had to do was reach back with my magic. Although, it felt a bit more awkward because his magic felt like it was on me rather than around me. It felt less like the rose illusion and more like when he kissed me. Our magic tangled up together, all over me. Needy. Frantic. I felt my cheeks growing hot at the similar feeling about me now. I reached out with my magic but it felt more like I was reaching in on myself, trying to pull his magic off of mine.
The illusion began to form in front of me but it was blurred and lacked definition. I could just make out a bed with red curtains around it. Sarkan was in the bed but the illusion was so poor I couldn’t even tell if he was sleeping or awake. It was strange to see him in a bed. In fact, I don’t think I’ve ever seen him truly asleep or even relaxed for that matter. To picture him lazing around his bedroom seemed so out of place, yet intriguing at the same time.
I tried to give the illusion more structure but, while the colors brightened a bit, the image itself remained blurry. I suppose structure was more Sarkans’ expertise. I think the spell needed the strongest aspect of a wizards magic, so I thought about it for a moment. What was I good at? Then it came to me.
“HEY SARKAN, WAKE UP SLEEPY HEAD!”
The image snapped into view, Sarkan let out a frightened yelp, sitting up so quick his face practically in mine. The image so clear it was as if he was in the room with me. I could see beads of sweat forming on his brow. He struggled to pull his blanket around him as much as possible.
“How on earth! Why do I even question it anymore?” shaking his head and pinching the bridge of this nose.
“So what do you want at such a late hour?” he asked breathlessly.
“You called me!”
“I called . . . you?” his face began to turn pink and he let out a frustrated groan into his pillow.
“So you were making an illusion of me in your bedroom,” I teased. “And don’t tell me it was to help you think, because you constantly remind me how distracting and annoying I am to you.”
He cleared his throat at a loss for words. “If you must know, I was having a vivid dream. I suppose I may have accidently, momentarily, conjured your form, but only because you are someone familiar to me.”
“I don’t know Sarkan, you’re quite sweaty and when your magic called to me it felt very . . . intense. Hmm, I wonder what kind of dream you were having. Maybe you weren’t even dreaming at all.” I saw his face turn bright red with anger and embarrassment. I suppose I had gone too far with all my teasing.
“Get your mind out of the gutter you insane sicko! Can a man have no peace or privacy! You have been nothing but a thorn in my side since the day I meet you and if I could I’d leave you at the capital and find a spell that could erase you from my mind, I’d be all the happier!”
The, ‘not just illusion spell’ closed (because I haven’t thought of a better name for it) abruptly after Sarkans’ tantrum. All his yelling and protesting strangely brought a smile to my face. I think it was because it only proved to me that I made a bigger impression on him than I even knew. I was happy to know that I wasn’t the only one who couldn’t stop thinking about that kiss!